Posted by: John () on Thu Apr 5 08:37:40 2007

My son hits the ball a ton. However, without me ever advising him to do it, he has acquired the habit of letting go of the bat with his top hand almost immediately after contact. See this link:
http://home.windstream.net/liper/
I recognize this as one of the tenets of Charlie Lau's approach to hitting. Does this rob my son of power? Or is it a good hitting mechanic that enables full extension? Jack seems to suggest in his excellent video (I don't want to put words in his mouth--maybe he'll elaborate) that follow-through is somewhat overrated because the ball only spends a fraction of a second in contact with the ball.
So, is releasing the top hand inconsistent with the theory of rotational hitting? It is linked, rightly or wrongly, to contact hitting rather than power hitting, but I have noted that Big Mac released his top hand immediately after contact and he wasn't too shabby of a slugger!